Market intelligence firms unanimously agree that the global recession will have a serious impact on consumers’ purchasing power. Harding-Rolls predicts that the impact will be felt “more significantly later in 2021” after the initial surge of early adopters dies down. He’s also of the view that since next-gen consoles will be backwards compatible and “most” new third-party games will support older consoles as a result, players impacted by the recession won’t feel the need to upgrade their hardware right away.
“Stating that the games sector is ‘recession proof’ holds some general truth as during downturns people find great value in playing games,” reads the report. “However, in 2020 the tendrils of games reach far and wide, so breaking down the industry into segments reveals that disruption is likely to be varied.”
Barring supply chain bottlenecks, Harding-Rolls expects both the PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X to launch around November 2020, with price tags between $450-$499. Additionally, he believes that the impact of COVID-19 on video game development is only a short-term problem.
“The shift to home working has caused disruption to game development schedules and there has been a number of release delays for games that were close to launch when the crisis struck,” the report continues. “Games that are due towards the end of 2020, alongside the launch of the consoles for example, are expected to be at less of a risk to delays due to the ability to make up lost time over the next few months.”
Although COVID-19 reportedly thwarted Sony’s marketing plans for the PS5, insiders say that the company’s production capacity remains unharmed.
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